There is one thing that you can say about the folks in The Villages. That is, most of them like to move. There is the saying that every Villager has to have at least three houses here. I will have to admit that we meet the requirement. As with many, we kept moving south. Based on what is happening with growth here, we have definitely decided that this will be our last house. Otherwise, at some point we might end up near Bushnell which admittedly is closer to Orlando and its environs where our youngest son and his family lives. Nevertheless, we have surrendered – I hope!
In our case moving is second nature. Since The Blonde in the house and I married, we have lived in twenty different homes. Most of that was due to my vocation choice. City Managers often did not stay too long. Sometimes it was greener pastures that caused the move. Other times it was mean elected officials. Whatever the reason we became very proficient at moving, but proficiency in that area can get wearing after a bit. So here we stay so that our kids know where to find us if nothing else.
I am not certain the reasons for others moving in The Villages, but there seems to be an extensively large number of them. Our last move was to a Village that was brand new, and we have been here four years. The turnover in that four years has been amazing. There is one house not far from us that has had three different owners in three years. It is a very nice house and the present owners appear to be settling in, but more house sales seem to pop up all the time. Our neighbors on one side of us moved out a few months ago, and now the neighbors on the other side have just placed theirs on the market. It is enough to give one a complex!
The first next door neighbor who moved is now in their seventh or eighth house in The Villages, and the one ready to move is only going to their second. Both of them have gone against the grain in one sense. They have taken a north moving route. In fact, one has moved as far north as you can get in The Villages. It seems to me that if there are going to be orderly moves in The Villages that a Czar of some sort needs to be elected to make certain that folks follow the proper routing. We can’t have people just moving around “willy-nilly”. What will the other retirement communities think, for Pete’s sake?
I guess one positive is that with people moving around so much, you get to know more nice folks – and possibly even some who aren’t so nice. The latter, of course, does not appear very often as the vast majority of Villagers are very nice folks. This is true even if most of them seem to like loud music at the various venues around The Villages, and I have to plug up my ears. I hold no grudge on that since it is obviously my fault for growing up at a time when you could hear singers and orchestras without booming sound systems. Obviously, progress is good, and I am just a misfit. I humbly apologize for that and will try to do better on that score, which may be easier now since I am older and my hearing is not as keen as it used to be.
Let me close by noting that I hope all the people who move around in The Villages, even if it is willy-nilly, enjoy themselves at least for a reasonable period before they move again. I understand that Bushnell could become a strong attraction with Dade City not far behind. Bless you all!
Barry Evans writes about Life in The Villages for Villages-News.com
